Free Republic

Once a year, global elites from all sectors attend a five-day conference in the snow-capped town of Davos, Switzerland - which is supplemented by caviar, champagne, and all types of debauchery after hard work is over. The World Economic Forum 2024 is kicking off this week, with world leaders and business executives convening for discussions and events surrounding the most prominent issues of the day. The theme this year is 'Rebuilding Trust' - and will be attended by 3,000 guests. But when they descend on the small Alpine resort town of Davos, attendees do more than just discuss global conflicts,...

Forget the fondue. Caviar, magic mushrooms, gold-leaf desserts, A-list selfies, $2,500-per-night hookers and secret dinners are likely to be on the menu as scores of private jets touch down in Switzerland as soon as Sunday to bring the world’s elite to the small Alpine resort town of Davos for what’s officially known as The World Economic Forum 2024.

Clip from Lew Later (Elon Musk Has Second Thoughts...)Footage Of A Huge Ancient Fish | April 13, 2022 | LaterClips

Years ago, a satisfied customer sent a gift basket of goodies to my husband’s office, and he came home with a few of the things that were in it. One of them was a little jar of Capelin ‘caviar’. I had never had any experience with fish eggs; but one taste of that, and I was hooked. True caviar only comes from the sturgeon fish, and I’ve never been – and will probably never be – in the tax bracket to afford the best of that. What’s available to me is properly termed fish roe; and I very much...

- Now that's a whopper — a very old whopper! A 240-pound (108.8 kilograms) sturgeon that could be more than 100 years old was caught last week in the Detroit River by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The "real life river monster" was nearly 7 feet (2.1 meters) long, The typical lifespan is 55 years for a male sturgeon and 70 to 100 years for females, according to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. Frozen round goby, a tasty snack for a sturgeon, was used as bait on a long line that was deep in the river. All sturgeon...

Calvisano (Italy) (AFP) - With pools 85 times the size of the nearby pitches where Rugby Calvisano plays, the company Agro Ittica Lombarda is putting this northern Italian town on the map again -- as the world's top caviar producer. The story began in the late 1970s, when the town's steel mill teamed up with a Californian biologist to use the heat generated by the mill to warm pools to raise sturgeons, whose eggs are used to make the salty delicacy. The world's most prized caviar comes from wild sturgeon in the Caspian Sea. Agro Ittica was the first sturgeon...

There's bad news from Russia for caviar connoisseurs - prices of even the cheaper alternatives are up 70%, it's reported. Red caviar - or salmon roe - is usually at the more affordable end of the market, at less than a 10th of the price of the prized beluga in the UK. However, in Kamchatka territory, which produces up to 60% of Russian caviar each year, wholesale prices have jumped ...

A Russian vending machine company has installed machines dispensing red salmon caviar and roe at 33 Moscow locations, including the mayor's office. The machines have been installed at Mayor Yury Luzhkov's office and 32 other government and affluent office locations around the city, with more machines planned for sites including the Russian parliament, Britain's Daily Telegraph reported Friday. The tins and glass jars of the luxury food, available in various sizes, dispense for $5 to $20. The machines have proven popular with civil servants, leading the machine at the mayor's office to break down Friday, The Telegraph reported.

THOUGH he's battling GOP accusations that he's an Ivy League elitist, Barack Obama has a lifestyle of the rich and famous, like TV show host Robin Leach, who always signed off, "Champagne wishes and caviar dreams!"

October 17, 2008 -- THOUGH he's battling GOP accusations that he's an Ivy League elitist, Barack Obama has a lifestyle of the rich and famous, like TV show host Robin Leach, who always signed off, "Champagne wishes and caviar dreams!" While he was at a meeting at the Waldorf-Astoria at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Michelle Obama called room service....

THOUGH he's battling GOP accusations that he's an Ivy League elitist, Barack Obama has a lifestyle of the rich and famous,(clip)While he was at a meeting at the Waldorf-Astoria at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Michelle Obama called room service and ordered lobster hors d'oeuvres, two whole steamed lobsters, Iranian caviar and champagne,(clip)

KAMATCHSKAYA, Russia — In this tiny village on the Sea of Okhotsk, veteran fisherman were surprised when they went to harvest the sturgeon eggs used to make famed Kamatchskaya caviar. “My nets were torn to shreds,” said Piotr ‘No Relation’ Stalin, who has been plying these waters for forty years. “So were the nets of every other fisherman. Much to our surprise, the slashes were very clean, as if they had been made with a razor blade.” While the nets were repaired, Piotr’s son, Josef, put on diving gear and went to investigate. What he discovered in the murky waters...

Given the kinds of cases they’re getting these days, French courts are starting to resemble clown circuses. Last week a French court had to listen to “Goldfinger” George Soros’ whine about his human rights being violated for an inside trading conviction. This week, a French court gets to listen to Venezuelan “International Man of Mystery” Carlos The Jackal carp about not getting enough terrorist-issue Froot Loops inside his French jail cell. Apparently, pate and champagne aren’t happening for him these days in Paris. And for the Shagadelic Jackal, that’s no fair. The Austin-Powers-era Marxist terrorist is actually suing in a...

The global trade in legal caviar has been stopped by the United Nations, leaving gourmands gasping and conservationists cheering. "It's not good news. . . . I have clients who don't care about the price, they need legal caviar," said Mark Omidi, owner of the Toronto-based importer Caviar Centre. "It's the most prestigious commodity." Alarmed by the plunging number of sturgeon in the Caspian Sea, a UN agency dedicated to preserving endangered species has put the onus on wild-caviar exporting nations to prove that their conservation methods can protect the fish stocks. In the meantime, the Convention on International Trade...

MOSCOW, Jan. 3 - The global export trade in caviar, the briny eggs of sturgeon that for decades have been one of the world's most exotic and lucrative wildlife products, was abruptly ordered shut down today by the international convention that helps nations manage threatened species. Sturgeon products, legal and illegal, are thought to be worth at least several hundred million dollars each year. But scientists and managers have said for decades that the caviar industry, and the species that drive it, are in jeopardy. The world's remaining sturgeon fisheries have all suffered from plummeting populations, caused by a combination...

The worldwide trade in caviar and other products that come from the wild sturgeon has been banned by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. A spokesman said the decision was imposed for scientific reasons connected to dwindling stocks of sturgeon, and to bring an end to illegal poaching in the Caspian Sea. Every year the organisation approves fishing quotas for sturgeon proposed by nations from the Black Sea, Caspian Sea and Danube regions. Now it is asking for confirmation about stocks of the fish before it can agree to new catches, saying exporting countries should adopt a...

Beluga ban boosts domestic caviar farming By Laura Zuckerman Thu Nov 17, 2005 8:25 AM ET HAGERMAN, Idaho (Reuters) - After more than a decade growing in the spring waters of a commercial fish farm in southern Idaho, five dozen white sturgeon are ready to give eggs that will be marketed to U.S. caviar connoisseurs. The timing could hardly be better. A recent U.S. ban on beluga caviar from the Caspian and Black seas has sparked a boom for U.S. fish farms, which are stepping in to provide gourmet stores and high-end restaurants the much-loved salted eggs, or roe, from...

Uruguay roes its way to epicurean success BAYGORRIA, Uruguay (AFP) - Uruguayan caviar, once a local family's long-shot business venture, has swum its way onto the epicurean map and is poised to become the toast of the world's gastronomes. ADVERTISEMENT The idea was spawned just about a decade ago, when Russian satellite images showed that Uruguay could be an ideal place to breed sturgeon. Soon after, the Alcaldes became the first family in the southern hemisphere to produce caviar. Now they are trying to corner the world market through their company Black River Sturgeons -- ERN by its Spanish acronym.)...

Cohiba cigars move over: the new gift of choice between wealthy American gourmets with a penchant for illegal luxuries may soon become beluga caviar. From today, the US Fish and Wildlife Service is suspending imports of beluga sturgeon caviar and meat from the Caspian sea basin, including Russia, Iran, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. The decision comes after those countries failed to submit laws and plans for conserving the species, which was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act last year. Black Sea countries, which also produce beluga caviar, could face similar measures in the future. Conservationists applauded the decision....

John Kerry can already wow an audience with ‘Ring of Fire.’ Now a group of industry leaders is trying to convince Southern country music fans to support the senator in November. How does John Kerry plan to capture the hearts and minds of the so-called Nascar Democrats, those relatively conservative, rural Southern whites who tend to vote Republican? There's choosing an appealing running mate, of course. But there are some party insiders who think a liberal Yankee could take another route: country music. The Music Row Democrats (MRD) aim to do just that. Founded earlier this year in Nashville by...